The NIH has announced how it plans to save the biomedical research workforce. Will it work? Find out...

Last week, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced how it plans to
strengthen the biomedical research workforce in the United States during a
meeting of its advisory committee.

Last year, NIH director Francis Collins charged the Advisory Committee to the
Director (ACD) to recommend changes that would improve the country’s
biomedical research training. The request came in response to falling
success rates for NIH grants applications and increased competition for
independent research positions at universities. In June 2012, the committee
reported back to Collins, recommending that graduate programs should be
shorter and that they should prepare
students for a variety of research positions, not just those in
academia.

Last week, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced how it plans to strengthen the biomedical research workforce in the United States during a meeting of its advisory committee. Source: NIH

Now, NIH leadership has decided to act on most of the committee’s
recommendations. According to new NIH initiatives, graduate students and
postdoctoral researchers should have individual development plans for
expected careers, which should not be restricted to independent academic
careers.

To deal with increasingly lengthy training periods, the NIH believes that
institutions should establish expected durations to complete biomedical
PhDs. Full-time NIH support for this training period will be limited to five
years, according to the new plans.

In addition, postdoc stipends and benefits will be increased to compete better
with those offered in other scientific research disciplines. Also, the NIH
plans to increase awards that encourage research independence early in the
career, such as NIH Pathway to Independence Awards (K99/R00) and Early
Independence Awards.

To better assess the state of the biomedical research workforce and to plan
future training activities, the NIH will develop new systems to track all
students and postdocs supported by NIH. The goal is to continue to follow
the careers of graduate students and postdocs after they complete their
training.

But one recommendation that the NIH is not implementing is a suggestion to put
more students and postdocs on training grants. "It's very complicated
to do that. We felt that, if we implemented the other pieces of the plan, we
would accomplish the same goals," said Sally J. Rockey, NIH deputy
director for extramural research and co-chair of the ACD working group.

While some parts of the initiatives can be implemented immediately—such as
increased postdoc stipends and early career awards—others still need more
investigation. For example, the development of a comprehensive tracking
system for trainees requires coordinating with individual institutions,
which will take time to arrange. "Part of our implementation is putting
out requests for more information," said Rockey.